e perfection.
When this 'ne plus ultra' is reached, a quick curtain is dropped over
his career, and he lives in the memory of countless thousands as a
martyred hero of the most splendid moral and mental attainments.

"Who would not sacrifice life for such a climax? Many men have said to
Fame and Wisdom, 'Let me look upon your face and die'; many have come
to view their Gorgon features and cheerfully paid the price, and still
more have perished miserably on the way.

"Now, what is the murderer's sacrifice compared to these? He is
carefully attended, afforded every luxury, and at last, is whisked
away into eternity, quickly, and, as far as possible, painlessly, with
a grand opera and limelight effect.

"We have learned many things from Mongolia; gunpowder, the printing
press and many other great discoveries have been traced back to
Celestial origin. Let us, then, adopt her method of dealing with
troublesome subjects. A 'harikari' sentence saves the nation much
trouble and expense. A coroner's verdict of 'suicide by request,' is
much more simple, and just as good as a lengthy criminal prosecution,
besides affording the transgressor a choice of weapons. He may prefer
a strychnine sandwich to the rope, or an unobtrusive blow-out-the-gas
transition to the electric chair; he may choose to loiter carelessly
in the path of a metropolitan trolley car; to caress the rear
elevation of an army mule, or insist upon reading a spring poem to
an athletic and busy editor. Many persons are particular upon these
subjects and, if the individual liberty, which is the watchword of
our nation, is to be preserved, some license should be allowed even a
felon under such conditions.

"If we really wish to decrease and discourage vice, however, let us
go about it in a logical manner and hold up a terrible example to
those premeditating crime. The prisoner should be visited by none but
religious advisers of every denomination, except on certain days when
free admittance should be granted to sketch artists, camera fiends,
elocutionists and young authors. All newspaper articles relating to
his case should be carefully suppressed; no reading matter furnished
him except dialect stories, and amateur photographs, taken by
visitors, should be hung upon the wall. Between times the prisoner
might be employed in washing dishes for a cooking school and testing
the products of pupils. After two months of unremitting toil,
according to this itinerary, he mi